I keep hearing more absurd edicts from the joint commission. They've banned certain commonly worn shoes called crocs. They've banned pens that go around your neck. They also seem to have many other annoying and time consuming requirements. I think they are ruining bedside nursing. They seem to think that the more forms filled out, the better.
Yesterday I had a vent pt with restraints. We have a stupid restraint form that needs a million boxes filled every hour. It totally loses it's meaning and does nothing to improve care, but my manager has to worry more about this form than a million more important things. She's always reminding us to fill in the million boxes. I just check them off ahead of time. The pt had many other more important things going on, being on several drips, Q 1 hour blood sugars, and I was taking off orders all day long.
Anyways, I think the regulators have become a self-perpetuating bureaucratic entity in my opinion.
I have always thought that JCAHO would be much more useful if they spent their time counting horse droppings at the Kentucky Derby. And I have dealt with them for 35 years.
JCAHO recently came up with the nonsense that bags of saline or bottles of sterile water are 'medication' & have to be locked up. The last time I was around for an inspection, the nurses had to memorize the NPSG's and be prepared to recite them like second graders. (The NPSG's are a good idea, making nurses recite them from memory is ridiculous.) Apparently, they also consider it a major violation if nurses have water bottles on their med carts. (Sometimes nurses barely have time to take a drink, even if the water bottle is right there.)
JCAHO doesn't say diddley about staffing levels, which might be literally a life-and-death matter for hospital pts, besides maybe keeping nurses from deciding to leave bedside care.
I'm not a nurse, I'm 'justavolunteer', but even I can recognize a largely useless, self-perpetuating bureaucracy when I see one.
I feel about them kind of like I felt about OSHA when I worked in other fields. Not particularly useful, potentially harmful, and made up of many 'armchair quarterbacks' who feel the need to justify their own existence.
My opinion of JCAHO: they have to justify their existence. This is the same mentality that puts warnings on blowdryers "do not use in shower"!! :trout:
Looks like that Joint Commission has a serious public relations problem with the nursing community, judging by the disdain for them expressed on this thread. I think it's well-earned disdain, personally.
Bottom line: JCAHO accreditation, at all costs, has become a Holy Grail for health care facilities. Without it, facilities risk refusal of payment for services from major insurers, including Medicare, and no large facility can survive financially that way.
Well I guess nobody should be surprised that the insurance companies are controlling the purse strings..... it all boils down to $$$ doesn't it??
They are now issuing edicts to justify their own existence. The more things they find to ensure patient safety, the more paper work the nurse has, thus taking more time away from the bedside, and hindering the safety they seek to ensure.
My opinion of JCAHO: they have to justify their existence. This is the same mentality that puts warnings on blowdryers "do not use in shower"!! :trout:
And yet many a blond STILL DOES IT! (sorry, had to!)
I totally agree, GardenDove. The problem is, I don't think they really CARE about their image problem with the nursing community.
I also think that hospital administrations hide behind the JCAHO banner when they post certain rules. For example, requiring us to sign a form saying WHY we didn't get a flu shot, or stating it to be a JCAHO requirement that we tell them the nature of an illness when we call in sick.
We are JCAHO certified and don't have to do either of these. Admin has just found an easy excuse.
:rotfl:
P_RN, ADN, RN
6,011 Posts
All of the above and less. As useless as *** on a hog as my granny used to say.